Childhood and accession
[FONT="]1743, Royal Palace, York[/FONT][FONT="]:
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[FONT="]Edward XIII looked down at his newborn child. He seemed healthy enough. This time, they would give it a week before baptising him. Better to be on the safe side. His queen and wife, Siobhain, had come though the arduous thirty hours of labour despite all predictions though she was very weak. The king’s plump face creased into a tender smile. Perhaps this time the baby would survive. After seven miscarriages and three infant deaths, he didn’t think Siobhain could survive another pregnancy. He mused on his own unhappy childhood. Having produced an heir, his father, Edward XII, had ignored his mother, Ethelflaed of Mercia, for his mistresses. He was cold to Edward and neglected him before dying prematurely of syphilis. The king sighed. He had never really felt ready for his role, but would much rather have been an architect. His good-natured face brightened. Perhaps he could be known as Edward the Builder, like his ancestor Ethelred. Though if the boy died, he was more likely to be Edward the Last. Then, unwontedly, he made a firm resolve, a decision he was to keep all his days, uniquely: the boy would be well-prepared for the throne as well as loved. That at least he could do. Now what about these ceilings. The Earl of Richmond had been telling him recently about the Italian stucco work he had seen on his Grand Tour and had recommended architects. He beamed myopically. Everyone was so kind and clever. Well, the treasury was a bit bare, but he could probably raise more money from Lichfield.[/FONT]
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[FONT="]A Princely Education[/FONT][FONT="]: Edward, Prince of York, did survive. The king, his father, gave him the best of everything and his darling mother oversaw his education. Salisbury priests tutored him in Theology and Rhetoric. Winchester dons taught him Law and History. Scottish Mathematicians prepared him for his naval service. The celebrated scholars of Armagh, summoned by his O’ Neil mother, taught him the Classics. Native speakers instructed him in the usual Gaelic, Welsh and French, but also German, Italian, Spanish and (Byzantine) Greek. There were concerts and balls, hunts and military manouevres. His father had spared nothing to prepare him to be king and in so doing had all but bankrupted the realm. At fifteen, in 1758, he had become a Midshipman in the North Sea Squadron, learning practical seamanship, discipline and hard living. At twenty, he passed for Lieutenant and served in the Irish Sea Flotilla for three more years before the inevitable promotion to Commander. At twenty-three, in 1766, he was bought a lieutenancy in the Northern Borderers and spent three years as the butt of jokes of the drunken louts in the officer’s mess. In 1769 he was promoted to captain and finally allowed to return to court. His father arranged for him to serve as a secretary at the Foreign Office (1769-70), then the Treasury (1770-72) under the clerical cabinet ministers who dominated his father’s government. Though he had fought Richmond’s ascendancy as royal favourite and the unmitigated profligacy he encouraged in the king, he could not break his hold. His father’s guileless good humour simply refused to see ill in him. In exasperation and desiring to pursue further knowledge, he persuaded his father to name the worthy old Earl of Pontefract as his designated regent in case of mischance and also to allow him to travel on his Grand Tour. So, in summer 1772 he set forth, touring first the British Isles and then the continent. He had indulged his curiosity across the capitals of Europe: observing the slightly faded grandeur of France with a skeptical eye, the industriousness and piety of Germania-Polonia, Italian Art and Science, the fascinating revelation of Magyar constitutionalism and of course the other-worldly antiquity of Eastern Rome. The messengers announcing his father's death and his own accession had finally caught up to him in Persia in late 1777. At thirty-four he had become king and just as he had acquired a taste for poetry. It took him three months to return to Northumbria[/FONT]
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[FONT="]March 1778, Pontefract Castle[/FONT][FONT="]:
The elderly Earl of Pontefract was now finished with his duties as Regent, having acquainted the dashing young king with the full extent of the wide-ranging problems he now faced: likely bankruptcy, a restive peerage led by the insolent and ambitious Richmond, an insubordinate army and the ultras of the Ecclesiastical faction determined to oppose innovation. He was reaping the harvest of the last two reigns of excess and idleness. The Earl looked at the tall, vigorous, dark-haired young man sat opposite him in his study. He seemed quite cheerful with his glass of port despite the enormity of his problems. Would he have the gravitas to face it and the auctoritas to pull the monarchy out of the mess? After half a millennium on the throne was the dynasty in its dotage? Edward hadn't talked much during the various debriefings and conferences though he had asked cogent questions and written endless notes. He was always a good lad and bright, but would it be enough?
The young king looked up and smiled at his faithful Regent. How fortunate he felt in his support. Pontefract looked worn and tired, but he'd see him through another year or two with good advice.
"So," said Edward "I have given our dilemma a great deal of thought. Clearly, a firm, but not inflexible, hand is needed on the tiller. We must include the other factions from the Privy Council in the cabinet, but not their leaders. We will woo the Episcopals to divide them from the Earls and favour the Barons over the Earls. That means starting slowly with reforms. But, in any case, the most pressing problem is finance. We cannot default on our loans. It would compromise our sovereignty to have bankers from Lichfield, London and Antwerp dictating our policy. Therefore, we must retrench. But the structure of government and the army has to change at once. I am going to enlarge the cabinet and shift the chief executive function from the Lord Chancellor to a new office, the Prime Minister. It works quite well in Budapest. Anyway, it is the only way I can exert control. I have considered the personnel reports and watched many in the court and have come up with this cabinet. As you see, it draws on the old, but changes functions and leaves some empty titles now outside the cabinet.
The old Earl put on his spectacles and compared the list of the old cabinet and their affiliations with the new:
The last cabinet of Edward XIII:
Lord Chancellor: Adalbert Thorne (Episcopal)
Foreign Secretary: Bishop of Beverley (Royalist)
Lord Marshal: Earl of Westmorland (Jarl)
Lord High Admiral: Earl of Hull (Episcopal)
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Bishop of Ripon (Episcopal)
Lord Privy Seal: Earl of Lothian (Episcopal)
The first cabinet of Edward XIV:
Prime Minister: Bishop of Beverley (Royalist)
Foreign Secretary: Earl of Morpeth (Jarl)
War Secretary: Edward XIV (Royalist)
Admiralty Secretary: Baron Dalkeith (Royalist)
Lord Chancellor: Adalbert Thorne (Episcopal)
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Bishop of Ripon (Episcopal)
Home Secretary: Baron Leeds (Royalist)
Lord Privy Seal: Bishop of Bolton (Episcopal)
"As you see, I take a role myself and we have a near majority in cabinet. Thorne is a pragmatist. He'll see the value of keeping outside influences from Northumbria. The Jarls will be furious with the new military departments, but by wooing the Barons, we divide them. The Archbishop will agree because I will give him the majority of our ambassadors to nominate and because I'll have a quiet word about the abuses of celibacy we have documented among his subordinates, the mistresses, the comely curates and so on. Even the church can't afford a scandal. Still, it is quite risky and I may be overthrown." Edward grinned.
The Earl was speechless with the daring of the plan and taken aback by the king's sang-froid. He must have learned a thing or two in Constantinople. Perhaps he'd make a politician yet. He seemed to relish the game.
Edward suppressed his grin, reflecting not on his political position, but rather his near-escape in Isfahan. Just as well that asthmatic Canon Kendal from the Constantinople embassy had been so loud and so slow coming up the stairs of the inn. Dear Reza, the inn-keeper's beautiful twenty-five year old son, had got out of the rear window with exceptional celerity. He couldn't have taken the high moral ground with the Archbishop had he himself been caught in flagrante delicto.[/FONT]
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[FONT="]Two days later, Coney Street in York, The Treasury[/FONT][FONT="]:[/FONT]
[FONT="]"We simply must balance the budget," said the king. "The debt is now almost nine million crowns and the interest alone consumes one third of our expenditures. Father sold or mortgaged the last estates just to keep afloat last year. I am cutting expenditure on the palaces by two thirds. We shall keep only the palaces in York and Edinburgh open. All noble pensions will be rescinded immediately. We must simply plead necessity. Besides, the pensions are mostly guilt money from Grandfather to the battalion of his bastards. We can cut some money from the army and civil service, but not much. That still leaves a shortfall even if it is a decent year for the Head Tax, Tolls and Customs revenues. We must find more money."
[Author's note: The silver crown was the currency of early modern Northumbria. It was equivalent to about a shilling. There were twelve pennies to a crown.]
The Earl nodded, but was impressed. It would be touch and go though. There would be vocal opposition to the cuts from the Jarls. The bishops might support it, not least because the Archbishop of York was owed 400K Crowns and the Bishop of Bamburgh another 300K. Would it go beyond opposition? A number of idle wastrels would lose their income with no warning.
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Proper stand your teaspoon up in tea or that monstrosity that Americans try to pass off as Tea?